I have an interview coming up and as part of the interview, I'm required to do a 5 minute teaching demo for 3 - 5 year olds. I unfortunately, have no experience with children so I'm a bit unsure what to do. I have two ideas - actions or body parts but I'm not sure which one to execute.

For body parts (head shoulders knees toes, I was thinking), I would introduce the vocab with flash cards and change pitch and speed. Get students to copy me as I make associations between flashcard and body location. I would then temporarily ditch the flash cards and get them to copy my actions while saying each word and then launch into a slightly altered song using the four words and once again alter pitch. I would then end on a game where I lay the flashcards on the floor and encourage them to touch the card which corresponds to word I say. (My problem with this approach is that I have no "production" aspect, I think ~ presentation and practice though)

For action verbs, I'm torn between using a similar layout however, I was thinking I definitely need to get them to act out the action as it would add to the fun factor too but I'm not sure whether to start off on flashcards or launch directly into them copying me or whether to have that in the middle and whether to try to encourage them to do the action without me doing it too (might be advanced for young kids though). And also, I had an idea to use the flashcards where one side has the word on it and one side has the same picture without the word, therefore encouraging them to produce the word on their own?

Too many ideas, not enough direction. Any advice would be greatly appreciated

Five minutes isn't long, is it? Will you be really teaching actual kids, or just demonstrating what you would do in the interview?

If it's real kids, I'd probably do numbers, as it's easier to vary what you present depending on what they already know. Do counting up with fingers, then if they can reach ten already try going up to 20 and/ or counting down. There are then loads of other things you can do like songs, storybooks, TPR games (counting and touching things in the classroom, growing bigger then smaller while counting up and down, etc). Some more ideas of mine on Teflnet's sister site here:http://edition.englishclub.com/tefl-art ... s-1-to-10/

Let me know if you are thinking of sticking to body and I'll look at your lesson plan more closely, but first thoughts are only time for one point (i.e. no actions), "shoulders" isn't among the first things I'd want to teach, TPR better than flashcards, and they might not be able to read.

I intend to start off with a flashcard introduction - each card without and then with an indication of where the part is on my body. I'll encourage the kids to repeat. I'll then ask them "what's this?" with the flashcard still in tow and prompt them to respond and confirm if necessary.

I then intend to launch into my flashcard game to check their understanding. I'll model it and then execute. I'm thinking of having the "child" run and touch the card with the word and image that I say out loud.

I'll then ditch the flashcards and reinvent the "what's this?" I had earlier, but making indications of my own body.

It still seems like a lesson for older kids for me. Three year olds, especially, would respond much better to and actually learn more from touching and moving real body parts, e.g. balancing a piece of plastic fruit on the body parts that are called out, doing the actions from Eric Carle's From Head to Toe, or doing the Hokey Cokey song. You then touch and elicit the names of the body parts, then you could if you liked use the flashcards for a slow reveal game then choral drilling at the end (though some very young classes will be too shy to shout anything out in the first class).

I reckon it would be useful to get them to act out the gestures as well but I was told by someone else that launching directly into them doing gestures would excite them too much that they would cease to want to speak the vocab. This person actually worked for the company I'm applying to as well. Granted, she mentioned this was when I was torn between actions and body parts. I'll see what I can do to incorporate this however. =)